50 thoughts on “Our Daily Thread 7-19-17”

  2. So I teach for half a day today, then come home, only to leave for two days in New Orleans. This is a two day course on Career Visioning. It takes the place of an older course I have already had twice when I was with KW before. There is a new assessment that takes the place of the DISC profile. I have read mine. No real surprises. Turns out I will not argue with you. I will walk away. (DJ and others, maybe that is why the FB test told me I was a Quaker at heart). It’s not that I don’t have opinions, it’s that it isn’t worth my time and effort to argue with you. All it does it frustrate me because you are too stupid to see that I am right. I will just find a way to go around you.
    Circumstances have made me timid about sharing my ideas and solutions. It isn’t that I don’t have good ideas, it is that I hold them in. That part might come from being around quite a few engineers in my life. My “Why can’t you just…………?”, was often met with, “It won’t work”. Later when I came back and fixed it for them, I didn’t rub it in.
    Then there is the little problem of I don’t trust my judgement. Time and circumstances have proven to me that I tend to trust the wrong people, so I am never really sure of my judgement of them until I have it confirmed by several other sources.

    OK. Therapy and self evaluation is over. My breakfast is ready and I need to review for today’s class. I don’t like when I feel unprepared.

    Liked by 7 people

  4. Good morning, AJ, Kim and Chas. 6:00 here.

    I filled out an app to get a debit card yesterday. And I built a website yesterday. Haven’t published it yet, though. I don’t have everything the way I want it yet, and have hardly any content at the moment.

    Today I woke up and thought, no, the site is too placid and serene. It needs some zing to it, I think, to draw people to action.

    More thinking and tweaking to do… (And tweaking is probably not the right word. Overhaul, maybe?)

    Oh, and I set up another email account, one entirely for business purposes.

    All sorts of things I did yesterday that made for a day far different than usual.

    Hope your day is blessed, all. See you later.

    Liked by 8 people

  5. Concerning Phos’ 8:15 last night.

    Eccl
    For he shall not much remember the days of his life; because God answereth him in the joy of his heart.

    According to this, memory is not erased, but we don’t dwell on it. Like we now handle events of our childhood. Another life, but I remember what I was.

    Hope that helps.

    Liked by 2 people

  7. Same subject:
    My dad broke his leg in an industrial accident in 1942. He had to have a pin put in his leg and there wasn’t a time that it didn’t hurt. Kim’s husband might relate to that.
    He died in 1998. That is a long time to go through constant pain.

    He once said, “When I get to the New Jerusalem, I’m going to run all the way across it and turn around and run back and soak my legs in the River of Life.”
    I was skeptical at the time, but I’m beginning to see what he meant.
    Being in a wonderful place is better if you can remember how you got there.

    Liked by 11 people

  8. Being in a wonderful place is better if you can remember how you got there. Wow. Very powerful for me this morning. I believe time heals wounds but it is good to look back and be thankful you aren’t wounded anymore.
    Thank you.

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  9. Chas, the last line of your @8:04 post is what I was trying to say in a nutshell.

    I have an appointment for this morning. Please pray that the physician will listen and will understand what the next best step is for me to take.

    I don’t know if any of you know what the popular sci-fi TV show ‘Doctor Who’ is, or have heard of the small kerfuffle about the casting of the 13th Doctor, but I thought this blog post on the subject said a lot more worth reading: https://ariaemaher.com/2017/07/17/unpopular-opinions-the-thirteenth-doctor/

    Liked by 1 person

  10. I’ve heard of the idea that we will basically forget all of this life because it has so much pain . . . but as someone once pointed out, that isn’t really any different from reincarnation. Besides, pain when it is past need not be pain any more. In an imperfect world, sometimes it is still pain–we still miss the person who has died, for instance–but sometimes it makes the joy all the sweeter. I don’t “take for granted” the pleasures of having a husband, for instance, since I was 44 when I got him. I value friendship all the more for the contrast from two decades of my life not knowing how to make friends. And so on. When we are perfect, remembrance won’t come with a sting.

    My mother used to point out that “he will wipe away all tears from their eyes” doesn’t mean no tears in heaven, that we may weep for those who are not there, but after the time of weeping, no more. I don’t know whether or not that is a fair interpretation. But my mother was shamed for crying as a little girl of three or four, and didn’t cry again until her first husband (my father) died more than 50 years later. But without active tears, she lived a life in which sadness never really went away.

    The day I called police to check on my mother, while I waited for them to call me back saying her phone was unplugged, or she was injured, or she was dead, I knelt to pray. And as I knelt, I knew she was dead, and I fell on my face, and the words that came out of my mouth were, “Father, she is with You. Let her cry. Hold her, please, and let her cry.” And then I myself wept.

    Weeks later, I dreamed that I was standing outside and a pickup truck went by slowly, with my mom sitting on a lawn chair or something in the back. I went running, jumped into the back of the truck, and held her tight, crying as I did. And she held me back and said, “Oh baby, did it hurt that bad?”

    Liked by 4 people

  11. “Kim’s up and raising a ruckus” — I’ll say 🙂

    6 Arrows, congratulations on the website progress — and welcome to the 1990s with that debit card 🙂

    I’m doing a story this week on a little dive bar in our town that’s closing forever on Sunday — it’s been here since the ’40s, popular with the dockworkers but others as well. I was surprised as I’ve been by there so often (and it looks very sketchy, I have to say), but inside it’s really quite nice (and it’s used often by film crews for its classic look inside). An original wooden curved bar, booths, and, yeah, some very nice people. The bartender’s a hoot, the nicest guy, he used to work in Hollywood and Beverly Hills, including stints working at the Brown Derby in both places, and had stories of a lot of the stars he used to serve — Jack Lemon, etc.

    Says he cuts people off promptly when he thinks they’ve had too much. One of the men yesterday came over to the booth were we were doing the interview and says to him “I just want to thank you for being my bartender for all these years.” I’m sure it’ll be sad when they all say a final goodbye and turn out the lights.

    They’re tearing it down to build a drive-through Starbucks, sign of the times I suppose.

    Anyway, should be a fun story to write, the bar has long dubbed itself in ads as “the cheers of ….” (name of our town) and I can see that, seems like mostly people who all know each other. One of the guys, a 95-year-old WWII vet, stops in every afternoon, has 2 drinks, jokes around with everyone before going home.

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  12. Now that’s quite a weather vane in the banner photo.

    (Whales are very popular weather vane motifs in my town; looking forward to the story behind this one, it looks old … )

    Reminds me, I still have the horse weather vane I salvaged off of the house I grew up in, it’s in the garage and I plan to have someone, painters?, put it up on this house. That was my plan originally but then it ended up lost in the garage pile and I couldn’t get to it until now (it’s sitting neatly in a corner of the garage now, alongside the old hand water pump that was in the front yard at my grandparents’ home in Iowa — my mom had it in the backyard and I intend to put it out somewhere here, maybe on the patio, not sure yet).

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  14. Question for FB and snapchat type thing users: if you befriend somebody online and maybe even meet them in person, helping care for the two year old when the twins are born, for example. And they keep posting how good it is to wake up stoned (and they breastfeed) and one of the babies has been in for a broken arm and broken ribs and so forth (at three months of age) do you intervene when they talk about suicide or another binge? If so, how?

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  15. Better you than me. I believe in the jury of peers but hope never to be part of one as my attention span is worthy of the strongest ADD drugs.

    Liked by 1 person

  16. Sounds like OJ may make parole this week. Now there was a murder and a trial that turned us upside down, especially here in LA. I still remember the shock and elation — the reactions were polar opposites among different groups of people, mostly racially drive — following that verdict.

    Liked by 1 person

  17. Mumsee, I think the first order is to speak directly to the person in question. Admonish her! If the children are in danger, I feel that a call to child protective services is in order.

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  18. Thanks, RKessler, daughter did just that. She has talked with her about the effects, and how it is to live separated from one’s mom due to drug use, and how anger needs to be dealt with and not on the child. She called a couple weeks ago when the mom was talking suicide and the woman was angry with her for calling. The police found her sitting on the couch with the children, all fine. This time, I encouraged her to talk to the local police dept folk and ask what she should do. They told her to call the police in the area of the woman (a state that allows marijuana use in adults), she did, they went to her and tested her and she is angry with daughter. I figure, she knows how daughter sees it, and she continues to talk about her behavior on social media, that is a plea for help.

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  20. Have I ever mentioned on here, my opinion of cats? The utter disdain I hold for them? We have cats. Two of them. We feed them. I do. Every morning, I feed them. I took them in for their shots so they would not get sick with rabies and all. I see that they have water. Last night I was woken and kept awake for two hours. Something was on my deck, making noise. It sounded large. I did not see anything. This morning, I stepped on cat food while walking through my bedroom door into the main house area. Where do I feed the cats? Outside. How does the catfood get into my house? Mice. Yes, mice. While the cats were in my new raised beds, under the cover we put over it, digging up the flower bulbs, the mice were bringing the cat food indoors. Again.

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  22. Mice are smarter than they look, I suppose. But rats are smarter, they know how not to get caught by people.

    Shortly after I moved into my house, I had to replace the heating system and had forced air put in. That required holes to be cut in the floors in every room. And that let in “things.”

    Among them was a rat who (unbeknownst to me for probably days or maybe even a week or two) took up residence in a drawer in a free-standing desk in my kitchen. I finally found him when I came home on a lunch break and decided to go through some of the dish towels … began finding dog kibble, piles of it. Back then I free-fed my dogs, left dry kibble out in the kitchen in their dishes. The rat apparently was hoarding it for when the famine might strike.

    In another drawer, I discovered what was apparently his bathroom ewwww. And then the sleeping quarters with a towel completely shredded up. Honestly.

    Anyway, as I was disturbing his comfy little nest, he bounced out the back of the drawer and dashed across the kitchen floor, leaping on top of and over behind the washing machine, my big shaggy terrier Ellie giving chase.

    Fun times.

    Liked by 1 person

  23. This isn’t the same as the situation Mumsee mentioned, but when Mrs. McK discovered that her then-three-year-old daughter (Chickadee’s best friend) was being molested by the babysitter’s husband & 12-year old son, she called & talked to the mom, telling her she was reporting it to the police.

    The detective on the case said that that pretty much muddied the case. It gave the man & son time to come up with a story. If the detective had shown up unexpectedly, the son probably would have let the truth slip. Mrs. McK will probably kick herself for that mistake for the rest of her life. (No charges were brought against either of them.)

    The girl went through a time of being afraid of all men, including her own dad, which broke his heart, & she couldn’t sleep without a light on for many years. (They had threatened that if she told, they would come & kill her family in the night.) This is the young lady who is now a lesbian. But she & her sister don’t want to think that has anything to do with her having been molested.

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  24. An interesting quote from a book I’m reading about dementia.

    “I have three types of patients: those who are normal and admit they forget, those with dementia who forget they forget, and those who lie.”

    I’m still normal

    Liked by 5 people

  25. As a nurse, I’m a compulsory reporter. Any allegations or suspicions of any kind of child abuse or sexual abuse at any age I have to report as soon as possible to the police and any other authority (e.g. the regulating body if the abuser is a licensed professional). In school, they advised us if we suspected abuse to avoid confronting the suspected abuser and rather phone the police, since confrontation could put the victim in more danger.

    Liked by 2 people

  26. In one apartment she used to live in, Nightingale wondered why her undies were disappearing. Turned out there was a rat who was stealing them out of the laundry basket to make his bedding.

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  27. Third Arrow has had a good afternoon. She drove to town earlier to drop off three employment applications she had picked up recently and filled out. Then she stopped at the library and, while there, got a call from one of the places where she’d applied, and now has an interview set up for Friday. 🙂

    Within five minutes of arriving home, another of the businesses called. Could she come in for an interview by 5:00 today?

    And . . . she’s on her way back to town in freshly ironed clothes . . . 🙂

    Liked by 6 people

  28. Chas – Many dementia patients, at least in the beginning, try to cover up their forgetfulness, like pretending they remember something they’ve been reminded of, even though they really don’t, or making excuses. My MIL did that.

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  29. I’ve had a good afternoon, too. I filled out and submitted the online form for the free listing in a local magazine’s arts directory that I told you about the other day. But I was also interested in finding out about possibly getting a paid ad set up sometime, because you can list your website as part of that. So I called the number of the person who handles that, and, in addition to learning more about further advertising with them, I found out the lady I spoke to lives in my same community and has a daughter who has indicated an interest in starting piano lessons! The mom said she will talk to her husband and daughter, and they may set up an interview. Yay! Really nice lady to talk to — she works from home some of the time, and we talked on the phone for over half an hour. 🙂 So much in common we have, and with each of us having lots of questions for the other regarding our businesses, the time really flew by!

    Liked by 6 people

  30. Well, that didn’t take long — daughter is already back home, and her interviewer said she’d love to have her on her team!

    Orientation is next week. 🙂

    Liked by 9 people

  40. Mumsee, that really puts your daughter in an awkward position. I am sure she wants to keep the door open in the relationship, but the need to keep the baby safe could close it. Will add that to my prayer list.

    Liked by 1 person

  41. Thanks for all the encouraging words with the jobs business! The day has been full of blessings — praising God!

    Kizzie, yes, she is the daughter who reminds me of your Chickadee in some ways.

    Today has been a real confidence-builder for 3rd Arrow. The interviewer asked her if she’s had experience preparing food while talking with customers (she’ll be working at a take-and-bake pizza place), and, while she doesn’t have job experience, she told the interviewer about her experiences at home preparing meals while conversing with her younger siblings. I’m glad daughter thought to point that out, as that’s very applicable.

    When she was offered the job, they said they wouldn’t be able to give her more than 30 hours, and at first it would probably be less than that. So she is keeping her interview at Subway for Friday, to see if she can have more than one outside job, since this one today won’t be full time.

    Exciting times, watching as the children grow and bloom. 🙂

    Liked by 3 people

  43. The smooth-running, very good day we had here was tempered somewhat by a hard piano lesson. Same student as last week — the one I mentioned who was entered in a competition slated for eight days from her previous lesson.

    Which means the big day is tomorrow. Things fell apart last week, and while she made small improvements this week, I think we both know it’s not going to go well tomorrow. 😦

    Nothing like this has ever happened in my history of teaching piano. She had the piece not perfect by any means, but acceptable to be played for others. That is gone, and it’s painful to see her struggle. She fought back tears last week. Tonight they flowed.

    I can’t tell you how many times in the last two lessons I felt like telling her we would need to drop the piece for the competition. I did ask her last week if she wanted to do another piece instead, but she wanted to stick with this one.

    If it had been anyone else, I would have said that’s it with that piece, it has to be laid aside, and we’ll have to withdraw from the competition. But because she works so hard, is so persistent about seeing things to the end, it would absolutely crush her to be told, no, I’m not letting you play that piece, especially since this all started happening so close to the competition date.

    It has to be carried to the end, no matter how bitter the end will be.

    Would you mind praying for her tonight? I don’t know what. The Spirit will give you the words.

    And for wisdom for me? She left her lesson tonight in calm spirits and emotional equilibrium, but I don’t know how I will help her through what I can only imagine will be one of the toughest things either of us has experienced, as a music student and a music teacher.

    Thank you, and good night to you all.

    Liked by 3 people

  45. Rkessler, she is nursing twins. So the concern was for the twins and the two year old. And obviously the mom as well.

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  47. This summer I am trying to be diligent about using up stuff we already own (food, for instance) instead of buying more, where possible. (Produce pretty much has to be bought as it is needed.)

    In sorting through the hall closet to see what all can be brought out to be used, I was astonished to discover we had not one, not two, but five packages–all of them opened–of gallon freezer bags. We also have three jars of (unopened) ranch dressing . . . though no one living in this house now eats it, and no one who lived in this house a year ago ever ate it very often. (At least one jar was free . . . but I don’t eat even free ranch dressing . . . ?)

    Liked by 2 people

  48. I was busy putting away books and other items that have collected all over the living room tonight, and I have 2 more Salvation Army bags started.

    Then I walked the dogs and now am trying to cool off in front of the fan. Busy summer nights.

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  49. No salad dressing in my hall closet, at least — but there were some antique books from “home” I had to haul out to the garage last week. Now there’s plenty of room for all my towels and bathroom things.

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  50. Sad situation, Mumsee. Is CPS not already involved with the fractures? Protocol in our state would have been an automatic referral.

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